Moonlight Man by Judy Griffith Gill Page A

bore. Of course, she’d known he wasn’t one for scintillating conversation, and he didn’t have an endless store of interesting tales to tell, but she hadn’t known before just what a dull person he was. She had simply seen him as safe, and safe was what she was looking for. She had thought boring would be nice for a change. It was not. It was simply … well, boring.
    However, to her dismay, Lorne made it clear over their coffee and liqueur that he wanted to take their relationship several steps further ahead than she was prepared to consider, and all of a sudden the conversation wasn’t dull. It was downright horrifying.
    Leaning across the table, he shoved aside the candle that separated them and took her hand. “Sharon, why don’t we get married?” he said, stunning her completely.
    “Lorne! We’ve never even been to—I mean I don’t think we know each other well enough yet to make that kind of commitment.”
    “We’ve never been to bed together,” he said, finishing the sentence she hadn’t, “because you’ve always kept up a barrier between us. But I realized on this trip with the kids that I can’t do it all alone any longer. I mean, well, Marilee didn’t exactly get sick.” He grimaced. “She, uh, got her period for the first time. Really, Sharon, it was a terrible time for me,” he added earnestly, a frown on his long face. “It just blew me away! I wasn’t prepared to deal with something like that! I got a hotel chambermaid to come in and help her, and we caught the next flight back. It was no fun, let me tell you.” He shoved his hair back in an uncharacteristically nervous gesture and she couldn’t help but notice he drew it forward again to cover his growing bald spot.
    “And Heather is nearly ten,” he went on. “It’s going to happen to her, too. Thank goodness Phil won’t pull a lousy stunt like that one on me.”
    Sharon had the feeling that Lorne had been more concerned with his own feelings than those of his likely frightened daughter.
    He seemed to blame his daughter for something over which she had no control. She hoped he hadn’t made poor Marilee feel dirty or guilty or ashamed, that he’d had the sensitivity not to let his own obvious repugnance show, but suspected that he probably had made his daughter feel worse. She could only hope that the girl’s mother had taken up the slack when the kids were dropped off on her several days before their vacation was supposed to end.
    “So you see what I’m saying, don’t you? If you and I were married, then when the kids are with me, and something like that comes up, you could handle it. I mean, women are so much better at things like that than men are. Not unnaturally,” he added with a short laugh. “And your boy is going to need some questions answered in a couple of years, questions my son Phil will be able to handle a lot better than you will.”
    She stared at him, noticing that he didn’t say he’d be willing to guide Jason, but would turn the chore over to his own son. “You want us to get married so we can see each other’s children though puberty?”
    He squirmed uncomfortably and glanced around to make sure no one had hear her. After all, it wouldn’t do for one of the town’s leading bank managers to be overheard discussing such a thing in public.
    “Well, that’s only part of it. Neither of us is getting any younger, you know. Why should we spend the rest of our lives alone just because we both failed at marriage the first time? I mean, your looks won’t last forever. How many more chances do you think you’ll get?”
    “My looks,” she said, not making any attempt to hide her annoyance, “seem to be holding up fairly well, Lorne. At least, I haven’t heard any complaints lately.” She wondered if he knew how ridiculous he looked with his hair combed over from a part way down by his left ear? Who was he to talk?
    “All right. You look great. You always do,” he said, clearly knowing he was